Lifestyle
Why Jenny Slate sometimes feels like a 'terminal optimist' : Wild Card with Rachel Martin
Jenny Slate says she’s always looking for the light in the dark.
Photograph by Emily Sandifer; illustration by NPR
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Photograph by Emily Sandifer; illustration by NPR
Jenny Slate says she’s always looking for the light in the dark.
Photograph by Emily Sandifer; illustration by NPR
Welcome to Wild Card from NPR, where host Rachel Martin asks guests randomly-selected questions from a deck of cards. Tap play above to listen to the full podcast, or read an excerpt below.
I spent a lot of years hosting news shows at NPR and I got really tired of covering stories that reinforced how bad everything in the world was.
Basically, I was burned out. But it was also bigger than my job. My dad died unexpectedly and my mom had died a long time ago, so I felt empty and sort of lost. And I felt this urgency. All I wanted to do was think through really big questions about what it means to be alive. What experiences made us who we are? What lessons do we have to learn over and over? What beliefs help us make sense of the world?
And when I started opening up about this to friends, I realized that a lot of other people were also swimming around in these kinds of questions. So I thought, what if we talked about this stuff out loud? And wouldn’t it be cool to do it with people who, on the outside, seem like they’ve got their existential act together? But that’s a little intimidating. So we came up with this idea for a game to make it easier.
This is the way it works: we made this little deck of cards with really big questions on them. My guests pick cards from the deck at random. And then they answer the questions.
And I’m telling you, it’s amazing what happens. They start talking about ideas and experiences they haven’t talked about before, and then, I’m doing the same thing. I always leave these conversations feeling better — feeling that no matter how different we are, we’re all working through the same stuff.
And my hope is that this is going to happen for you too. That you’ll find yourself thinking about these questions and how they fit into your own life.
And I couldn’t have dreamed up a better guest to get things started than Jenny Slate. She is one of the deepest, most interesting comedians out there, in my opinion.
That comes out in her stand up and her movies, especially Marcel the Shell with Shoes On, which is one of the weirdest, most random, beautiful movies. You might know her from Obvious Child or for her role as Mona-Lisa Saperstein from Parks and Recreation.
This year, Slate released her latest comedy special called Seasoned Professional, which, at this point in her career, she really is — even if she’s still figuring out life like the rest of us.
The trailer for Jenny Slate: Seasoned Professional.
YouTube
So, let’s shuffle the Wild Card deck and draw our first question. Which is…
Question 1: What’s an ordinary place that feels extraordinary to you because of what happened there?
Jenny Slate: This sounds maybe gross or something, but I really feel that way about our bedroom in Massachusetts. And not because I’m like, you won’t believe what went down in here [laughs].
My husband is someone I met as a stranger and I really felt that I would not see him again. I thought about him a lot and I heard from another friend about where he lived in Massachusetts. And it felt to me that he lived almost in another dimension.
And I just remember the first time that I went to sleep in his bedroom and I was like, wow, this is a real place. It’s kind of like seeing the Eiffel Tower, like, I can’t believe it is real. And even though we live in that house together now, I still feel that way.
It’s a house that was built for his great grandmother, and when he lived there by himself it was filled with, like, a hundred years of stuff. And it felt very bachelor-y, like Dickensian bachelor-y. Like, there’s a taxidermied tortoise in here and heavy draperies from before. And now that we live there, it’s very sparse. I prefer a more Shaker aesthetic.
Rachel Martin: You had been married before. Did something have to change in you to make this relationship work, or was it just timing?
Slate: I couldn’t stop the timing of falling in love with him. And it was right for both of us to fall in love. But while walking down that path, I was very aware that I was injured. And I had to learn to trust — not just the big things, like I hope this person won’t lie to me, but also, I hope they won’t tell me they’re having one experience while having another. I hope they won’t secretly resent me for the things that they first felt were attractive about me.
As a performer, you want to shine your power out and that can be really attractive to people. But then all of a sudden they can get angry about it. That it’s not just for them. And so I do think that I really had to do a lot of work on my side of the problem in terms of learning to trust self-worth issues. But I am also an operatic romantic. I just love love, and that really helps.
Question 2: What is something you think about very differently today than you did 10 years ago?
Slate: Dressing. Not salad dressing, I’ve always loved it and I’ll never stop. Dressing my body.
Martin: What is different about how you think of that?
Slate: I’m pleased to say that I’ve come through a fair amount of internalized misogyny. So 10 years ago I was 31 and it was like, “You better wear that bikini.” You know, just these horrible, brutal feelings about my physical body and about how I needed to present what sexiness was and how much of my body to show.
I’ve always had a pretty clear sense of what I find to be beautiful. But I feel like it was sort of muddled up, and now I just want to dress like Jane Goodall, but like sometimes with a crop top. Like, let it flow.
I used to feel that I had to prove that my butt was there. And now I’m like, it’s not relevant whether or not you think my butt is there. I know it’s there. My toilet knows it’s there. And my husband knows it’s there. And, unfortunately, some of my friends know it’s there.
Question 3: Is there anything in your life that has felt predestined?
Slate: I don’t really connect to the concept of destiny. Sometimes I get scared and ask my husband, “What if we hadn’t met each other? What were the chances?” And he always goes, “100%.” And I like that. I don’t know about the soul mate thing, and I know it sounds so cheesy, but I do feel like he’s my spiritual match.
I guess I believe in a spiritual eventuality, which you could call destiny, but it’s more like a point on the globe. It’s like a fixed point, but it doesn’t mean you’ll get there. You still have to do things to get there. It’s an option.
But no, I’ve never felt like anything was predestined. I’ve just felt as if every now and then there’s a kind of meteor shower and good fortune falls into my life like that.
Martin: Have you always been good about appreciating the meteor shower or has that come later in life for you?
Slate: I think I actually have been. And I think it’s because my mother, who I love dearly, can be rather negative. If you ask her to tell a story, it often sounds as if it were cloudy in the sky, like it’s just with this sort of tinge of dread and negativity. And it’s kind of drama. It’s drama.
My response to that has been to be, no — sunshine! And it can also make me be a terminal optimist in the worst way, like almost a fool. But I think I’ve always had that kind of look out. It’s not a Pollyanna-ish thing. It’s looking for light in the dark. That’s what it is.
To listen to this full conversation, tap play at the top for the Wild Card podcast.
Vivica A. Fox dreamed of being a model, but in order to receive her mother’s blessing to move to Southern California, where the jobs were, she had to promise her one thing: She’d go to college.
So that’s what she did. At 18, Fox left her hometown of Indianapolis for Huntington Beach, where she attended Golden West College and got an associate’s degree in social sciences. On weekends, she’d drive up to L.A. for auditions, getting her first taste of show business while dancing on Don Cornelius’ iconic television series “Soul Train” and later nabbing her first acting gig as Dr. Stephanie Simmons on “Young and the Restless,” a role she recently reprised after more than 30 years.
In Sunday Funday, L.A. people give us a play-by-play of their ideal Sunday around town. Find ideas and inspiration on where to go, what to eat and how to enjoy life on the weekends.
“The rest is kind of history,” says Fox, who went on to star in other hit films including “Kill Bill: Vol. 1,” “Two Can Play That Game,” “Soul Food” and “Set It Off,” which celebrates its 30th anniversary this year.
Her latest project, “Is God Is,” hits theaters Friday. Directed by Aleshea Harris, who wrote the award-winning play of the same name, the film follows twin sisters as they embark on a vengeful quest to find their abusive father, who left them for dead. Fox plays God, the twins’ mother, a burn victim and domestic abuse survivor who gives her daughters a simple yet chilling instruction: “Make your daddy dead. Real dead.” Harris handpicked Fox for the role.
“I just was so honored,” Fox says. “Then when I got the script and dove into it a little bit more, I was like ‘Ooh, this is a way no one has ever seen me. This is going to be challenging.”
She adds, “I was like, ‘Wow. We don’t get things like this,’ so it was honestly, for me, a no-brainer.”
Sundays are the one day of the week where Fox can “do me,” she says. Here’s how she’d spend it in L.A.
This interview has been lightly edited and condensed for length and clarity.
6:30 a.m.: Quick coffee run
I’m usually up by 6:30 or 7 a.m. I’m an early bird because I’m so used to either having to be on set or when my publicist, B.J., was living on the East Coast and I’d have to respond to answer his emails in a timely manner. Once I’m awake and settled, I’d get some Starbucks. I’d order a venti white chocolate mocha with an extra shot of espresso, no whipped cream. I used to order kale bites, which I’d eat with the meat from the sausage and egg sandwich, but they discontinued them so now I just get the sandwich.
8 a.m.: Float in hot springs
I’d head to the Beverly Hot Springs. I would get a body care treatment. It’s awesome because they rub you from head to toe with body oil, then they wash your hair and give you a cucumber and yogurt mask. After that, I would get a facial and float in the water. It is one of the only spas with natural, alkaline hot springs in L.A., so the water is just heavenly.
2 p.m.: Margarita and caviar fries with a view
After that, I would meet with a friend, more than likely B.J., at the rooftop restaurant at Waldorf Astoria. The reason why I love going there is because of the view. On a beautiful, clear day, you can see all of Los Angeles. It has a 360 view that is absolutely incredible. I would start off with the caviar fries and a spicy margarita with a tajin rim. Then I would do either the salmon with spinach or if it was a super cheat day, I’d have a cheeseburger.
4 p.m.: A Broadway show or a sports game
I’d probably go home and take a short nap. But if my godson, Quentin Blanton Junior, is in town, I’d go see him perform at the Hollywood Pantages Theatre. He’s playing little Michael in “MJ: The Musical” at the Pantages Theatre. [Editor’s note: We interviewed Fox before the show ended earlier this month]. I’m so proud of him. But if he’s not performing, I’d go to a Chargers or Lakers game. I’m a sports junkie. I’m from Indiana. We grow up on football and basketball. I’ve always loved the Lakers. I remember going to the games back in the day in Inglewood because I used to live there. I used to walk to the games. That was the golden era of Magic and all those guys, then Kobe and them moved up to Staples, which is now Crypto.
9 p.m.: Nightcap before bed
I’d end my Sunday with a night cap at the Delta Club at the Lakers game. I’d have a glass of wine before heading home, then I’d drink a Lacroix to hydrate. I try to be in the bed definitely before midnight.
Kayla Bundy likes to start her day with a cup of bone broth.
She buys her milk raw, snacks on sardines, eats authentic sourdough bread — no commercial yeasts here — and generally cooks with locally-sourced ingredients. On TikTok, where she has over 500,000 followers, she claims that her diet “fixed” her skin, her hair and her depression, and she sells coaching sessions to help others with their diets.
Bundy, a 27-year-old Christian content creator, might sound like your run-of-the-mill clean-eating type, but she believes her diet to be part of a higher calling. For eight years, she has been a biblical eater, someone who consumes mostly foods mentioned in the Bible. She is part of a niche but dedicated online community trying to tie religious values to dietary needs.
In an era when the Make America Healthy Again movement has pushed for more access to unpasteurized dairy products, stricter boundaries around ultraprocessed foods and new definitions for what counts as healthy food, alternative diets focusing on simpler foods are finding popularity, even when their proponents don’t actively consider themselves part of the MAHA movement. Add to that the growing numbers of GLP-1 users struggling to eat enough protein, and biblical diets can offer an appealing repackaging of certain age-old diet tenets. (The new acting commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, who assumed his role on Tuesday, is also a vocal champion for policies to remove chemicals from the food supply.)
“I had never really thought to look to the Bible for a recipe book,” Bundy, who grew up in Michigan and now lives in Bali, said, but after cutting out refined sugar made her feel good, she said, she started “studying scripture from that lens of noticing what they are eating.”
She added: “Sin entered into the world through food, and Satan doesn’t stop there. Food, for me, is really like a weapon of how I can fight back.”
Bundy is open about not having nutrition credentials, but she sells a $28 digital guide to biblical superfoods, as well as coaching sessions that start around $700 for a month, she said.
She’s not the only one. Like other health food influencers, the biblical eating proponents with popular accounts often sell products.
Annalies Xaviera, a stay-at-home mom who lives in Gainesville, Ga., and posts biblical eating tips, said her Facebook following had jumped from scant thousands to over 300,000 in just a few weeks this spring. She sells a digital cookbook.
“The Bible says that God appreciates and celebrates small steps of obedience,” said Xaviera, 32, who added that she did not consider herself part of the MAHA movement, but that some of its goals, like removing artificial dyes from foods, aligned with her own preferences.
She said her approach boiled down to eating whole foods and cooking meals at home. She still buys some processed foods, like pasta.
Eating biblically — which can mean strictly sticking to the good book’s ingredients, cooking from scratch or anything in between — is not new. “The Eden Diet,” a 2008 book, offered weight loss and nutrition tips rooted in biblical teachings. The author Jordan Rubin’s 2004 book “The Maker’s Diet” was a best seller (as was his recent book “The Biblio Diet,” coauthored with Josh Axe, a supporter of the MAHA movement, and published last year).
For years, some Christians have also participated in “Daniel fasts,” 21-day fasts based on the Book of Daniel in the Old Testament, in which Daniel consumes only vegetables and water. (There’s also, of course, the long tradition of religious diets, such as keeping kosher or halal, or following a Levitical diet. Jesus, himself, presumably kept kosher.)
On social media, however, biblical eating has appeared to have a resurgence in recent months.
A few years ago, the actor Chris Pratt talked about completing a Daniel fast when he was on “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.” In January, as part of his partnership with the prayer app Hallow, he posted a video encouraging his followers to use the app to participate in a fast and prayer challenge. The bean-heavy fast had made him quite gassy, he said with a laugh. Other celebrities, including Mark Wahlberg and Patricia Heaton, have been part of similar efforts with the app.
Casper Schimmer, a college student in Amsterdam, said he sold coaching sessions for young, Christian men looking to align their diet and exercise with their faith.
“It’s not like eating healthy only is what makes a godly person,” Schimmer, 20, said. He said he also focused on physical and mental fitness as part of a larger system of “godly habits.” (For example, sabbath as the “original biohack.”)
Jennifer R. Ayres, a religious education professor at Emory University, said the biblical food movement online seemed to show “a focus on personal decision making.” She added that “the more collective and environmental analysis of what’s happening in our food system” is missing from some of the social media dialogue.
Abbie Stasior, a Christian dietitian who lives in Nashville, said much of her work looked, at first, like standard nutrition guidance. She often starts with clients by talking about the importance of breakfast. But then she’ll reference Bible verses, pointing, for example, to a scene in the Book of John in which Jesus eats a balanced breakfast of bread and fish with his disciples. “He’s got carbs and protein,” Stasior, 31, said.
Tying dietary counsel to scripture offers “an extra incentive,” Stasior said.
When it comes to meeting nutrition needs, Dr. Marion Nestle, one of the country’s foremost nutrition policy experts, said that if people on the biblical diet consume ample calories and eat “a wide variety of relatively unprocessed foods,” they are “probably doing just fine.”
She also described how wellness culture had been colliding with policy.
“The thing about wellness is that it’s based on personal experience rather than science — it’s what makes you feel good,” Nestle said, adding: “Diet is about belief. We don’t have a lot of belief systems left in this country. People are desperate for meaning in their lives.”
Xaviera, the stay-at-home mother in Georgia, said she encouraged her followers to pause before eating, describing a person who might be deciding whether to eat a cookie.
“When you’re in a craving,” she said, “have you ever thought to stop and pray?”
My horny, teenage, never-been-kissed self would be appalled by what I’m about to tell you, but it’s true: I’m sick of being a sex buddy.
I am a sexually adventurous woman who has dabbled in BDSM and enjoys a good sex party here or there, but I also want a partner I can share a deeper emotional connection with as well. Unfortunately, I have constantly found myself stuck in relationships with emotionally unavailable men.
Which is why I got so excited when I saw Jon’s profile. It was on Feeld, the alternative app for kinky, polyamorous or sexually curious people — people like me. What I love about it is that people are explicit about their physical and emotional interests.
So, Jon wrote that he was interested in exploring his kinky side and that he ultimately wanted to find his forever person. I mean … samesies!
Jon was super cute. A very sexy, boy-next-door, Glen Powell type. But as I studied his photos, I realized I knew him. I racked my brain trying to figure it out, and then I remembered that we had sex 10 years ago.
We met on Tinder and got together a couple times for sex. This wasn’t rare for me back then, but the reason I remembered him so well was because he had this weird mystery hip problem, which made it difficult for him to walk and move his hips in certain ways.
When we had sex, our positions were limited, and I constantly worried that I was going to hurt him. I know people say they’re going to “blow your back out” during sex, but I didn’t want to literally break Jon’s body.
It was a bit of a buzzkill, so I just gave up on him — and ghosted him. Ten years later, there he was again, and I couldn’t help but feel like this was a sign. That the universe knew we weren’t ready for each other back then, but we were ready for each other now. We were getting a second chance to start fresh and go for it.
So I swiped him right, and we instantly matched. I messaged him saying, “Hey, so not to sound stalkery, but I think we’ve done this before. Like forever ago.” He wrote back saying, “If by forever ago you mean 2016, then yeah, I think so too.”
I thought, “Ohmigod, he remembered me too! How cute are we?!”
We caught each other up on the last 10 years of our lives. He said he had become a therapist and that he had his hips replaced. Nothing was gonna stop us this time!
We exchanged numbers, and he texted me. “Jon (Tinder)” showed up on my phone. I still had his number saved after all these years. I was even more convinced this was destiny. It’s like my past self knew this thing with Jon wasn’t over.
We made plans to hang out that week, and I was super anxious about it. I mean, my expectations were dangerously high, but as soon as we saw each other, there was this level of comfort and familiarity that made it all so easy.
We spent that entire day together reconnecting, and then the enthusiastic vibe continued. He texted me all the time and wanted to hang out — and not just to have sex! He wanted to hike in Griffith Park, hit up Thai Town for dinner and cozy up with some Nintendo “Mario Party.” I was getting more excited and hopeful about where this could go.
Then one night, we were talking about our kinks and other sex stuff. I didn’t say much other than I was generally down to try new things, but it wasn’t a priority for me. He, however, emphasized that he really wanted to “explore his kinky side now before he settled down in a relationship.”
I paused wondering, “Does he think those two things are mutually exclusive? Does he not think you can have an exciting sex life and a committed relationship at the same time? With the same person? Were we still doing Madonna-whore complexes? I thought those died out with low-rise jeans. Guess not!”
I wanted to talk to him more to get clarity about what he meant, but I never got the chance. A few hours before our next date, he texted me to say that he had hung out with his ex and they were going give it another go. He couldn’t see me anymore.
I was totally blindsided. I knew he had been with his ex for five years, but I didn’t know they were still talking or on the verge of getting back together. There was nothing I could do except say the calm, mature things you’re supposed to say and wish him luck.
Three days later, he came back. It didn’t work out with the ex. And you know, there are fewer things in life more vindicating than a guy dumping you and then crawling right back.
I had a million questions, so we had a long conversation about what happened, and the two most important things I learned were: 1. This ex wasn’t the five-year ex. This one was a new, more casual ex he briefly dated earlier in the year. 2. She was virgin. The Madonna-whore complex got literal really fast.
He kept apologizing and asked if we could start over again. Again, I was tempted. The fateful way this guy kept coming back into my life was compelling, but it became so clear that he only valued one side of me. I couldn’t wait for him to care about the other side. A partnership isn’t an “either/or.” It’s a “both/and.”
The sign from the universe, I realized, wasn’t to keep holding onto him. It was to let go. Of him and every guy who only saw me as a fraction of a partner.
The author is an actor, writer and public policy advocate based in Los Angeles. She shared a version of this essay at the L.A. Affairs Live storytelling event in April. She’s on Instagram: @ratigupta.
L.A. Affairs chronicles the search for romantic love in all its glorious expressions in the L.A. area, and we want to hear your true story. We pay $400 for a published essay. Email LAAffairs@latimes.com. You can find submission guidelines here. You can find past columns here.
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